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Eddie Murphy is funny. He is, even in crap like this. His cocky motormouth antics are almost always worth seeing, even if you have to sit through this kind of rambling waste of talent. He shines in a few scenes here, but then we have to have another pointless subplot thrown on top. This is a cheap technique used by lame-ass comedy directors, also known as 'hedging your bets'. For example, if a director is not confident about the actual COMEDY in his comedy, a quick-fix is to throw in a bunch of schmaltz and unrealistic characters. The director (or editor) then hopes that people will mistake it for something of substance. After all, a prison comedy can be dismissed easily enough. But a comedy with some fake emotion and sappy scenes may be mistaken for quality. Well, if you understood all that, consider yourself cured. You have been vaccinated against schmaltz.

The only way this movie could be more unrealistic is if The Great Gazoo made a cameo. This prison is like a summer camp, complete with cool bunks, baseball diamonds, barbecues, and nice ladies around. There's also a giant plantation (!) about 10 feet from this prison, and most of the inmates just hang around and shoot the shit. Oh, and did I mention that there are NO GATES around this prison? The explanation for this is explained rather clearly: There are no gates because if you try to escape, the guards will shoot you. Hm. Sounds a lot like gated prisons too, only easier to keep an eye on.

Mandatory plot synopsis--Odd couple get tossed in jail for life, although they are innocent. Hijinks ensue. Is Stir Crazy really that forgotten that we need a remake? Also, I can't remember a recent comedy that had this much contempt for it's own characters. Murphy and Lawrence are likable characters, they're pretty amiable and occassionally funny. Why then are these guys put through such horrible shit? It makes it hard to laugh when it's a comedy played for some realism, yet the circumstances are consistently cartoony. (Ha Ha!! They're trapped in a prison for 40 years! Ha!) To further illustrate this, we are introduced to a colorful and adequately stereotyped extremely cast of inmates. Just when these characters are starting to get interesting, they get 'dissolved' in a long musical montage. What the hell is going on here?

Just another example of a movie that tries to go too many ways and ends up going nowhere. Scenes just plop onto the screen from nowhere, from one to the next. There's no continuity at all, especially towards the end. It seems like the second half of this movie was edited with the 'eeny-meeny-mino-mo" technique, which I believe was invented by Ed Wood.

Beware of the 'raunchy, slapsticky' comedy that has scenes where the music starts to swell majestically, and the characters start to behave like they're in Chariots of Fire. This happens more than once in Life. If it had enough laughs to balance the schmaltz, we'd be fine. But it doesn't. Life stinks. But I still like Eddie Murphy. I swear.

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originally posted: 11/20/99 20:22:18
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